Tallahatchie
by Sadie Flood
Summary: Lorelai needs an audience. L/D. Written for the Improv.


Title: Tallahatchie  
Author: Sadie Flood (sadieflood666@yahoo.com)  
Rating: PG-13  
Improv: sleep, map, satin, ember  
Pairing: Lorelai/Dean  
Disclaimer: I don't own them. :)  
Spoilers: Not too explicit, but knowing the events of "They Shoot Gilmores, Don't They?" might be useful.  
  
* * * *  
  
"I'm pretty sure that would qualify as littering."  
  
Dean paused obediently with his fist in mid-air, poised to toss its contents into the water below.  
  
"Taylor would have you thrown into jail. I hear the troubadour's in there. Know what he did?"   
  
"He littered?"  
  
"A Snickers wrapper fell out of his pocket and onto the sidewalk. Totally an accident. He got five years. This type of premeditation? I'd be surprised if you got out before your 30th birthday."  
  
"At this point, I really wouldn't care." He dropped his hand and leaned forward on the railing, perched on his elbows.   
  
"Living on the edge, huh?"  
  
"You know me."  
  
"It's so sad to see you slide into a life of crime. But I'll probably come visit you in jail, so at least you'll have that to look forward to."  
  
He laughed politely, and they stood there in silence for a moment.  
  
"Hey," he said. "Taylor's not around. Does that mean you're gonna turn me in?"  
  
"That depends, Billie Joe."  
  
"Did you just call me Billy Joel?"  
  
Lorelai laughed and shifted her grocery bag from one hand to the other. "No. Billie Joe. Like the song?"  
  
"I know 'Billie Jean,'" he offered. "Billie Jean is not my lover?" He didn't sing it; he asked it, like a question.  
  
"No. 'I saw Billie Joe MacAllister throwing something off the Tallahatchie bridge.'" She didn't sing it either, just stated it like a fact.  
  
"Where's that?"  
  
She shrugged. "How the hell should I know?"  
  
"So the point was..."  
  
"The point was I don't know whether I'm going to turn you in or not."  
  
"What did Billy Joel throw off the bridge?"  
  
"No one knows."  
  
"What?"  
  
"I always thought it was a dead body. Or a dead baby."  
  
"Jesus."  
  
"Yeah. Country music isn't all about losing your wife and your dog and your job and your house."  
  
"Because sometimes it's also about throwing a dead baby off a bridge?"  
  
"Right. So what about you?"  
  
He opened his fist.   
  
"Ah," she noted. "The famous bracelet."  
  
"It was supposed to be a symbolic gesture." It was broken now. He hadn't asked how that happened. When he had demanded it back, she had handed it over without a word. He should have known better than to expect her to put up a fight.  
  
"Good for you. Go for it."  
  
He regarded her with surprise.  
  
"Seriously. I think it'll be good for you. Go on."  
  
He raised his arm again and threw the bracelet, hard, into the river.  
  
"Feel better?"  
  
"Not really."  
  
"Maybe you should go kill someone and throw their body off the Tallahatchie bridge."  
  
"Did it work out for the guy with the baby?"  
  
"Not really. He killed himself after."  
  
"Not a bad idea."  
  
"Oh, don't take it so hard." She rubbed his back with one hand affectionately. "There will be plenty of other bracelets to throw off bridges."  
  
"I know," he nodded.   
  
They stood together quietly for a long time.

* * * *

"Don't worry," she assured him. "She's not here."  
  
"Oh," he said, in a tone that clearly indicated her assurance didn't do much to ease his troubled mind.  
  
"She's at my parents' house. Don't ask." She tossed her coat onto the couch and sat down cross-legged in front of the CD cabinet.  
"Oh," he said again, and she had to bite her lip to keep from laughing at the relief in his voice. It was so amusing to her, and so tragic to him. She remembered the emotional roller-coaster her high school years had been, until they were cut short. She bit her lip again, for a different purpose this time, and resumed her search.  
  
"I know I have it in here somewhere," she said, more to herself than to him, as she rummaged through the shelves.   
  
"Didn't you tell me once that they were alphabetized? I remember thinking that was weird."  
  
"Oh, thanks. Yeah, they are alphabetized. But it's not here, and I don't know who else would want it." She snapped her fingers. "Yes, I do. I bet Lane borrowed it as some kind of kitschy curiosity." She shook her head and stood up. "Kids today. No respect for the past. Although that was probably the reason _I_ bought it."  
  
"Okay, well," he said, clearly at a loss; being in this house without her was awkward. "I guess I'll go, then."  
  
"It's okay. You don't have to run off. Why don't you stay for the evening? I rented movies," she said proudly, as if it were an accomplishment, or a secret she was sharing with him.  
  
"What did you get?" he asked, almost afraid to hear the answer.  
  
She produced a video from her paper shopping bag. "Pamela Grier is Foxy Brown!" she announced dramatically, setting it on the table. "It's inferior to the original, but it's still pretty good."  
  
"The original?" Why did he ask? Why did he care? He knew she'd launch into an overly-detailed explanation. Why not just smile and nod, leave it alone?  
  
"I'm so glad you asked," she replied, launching into an overly-detailed explanation regarding the movie Coffy, to which Foxy Brown was originally intended to be a sequel. She kept explaining the story of why exactly Foxy Brown was not entitled Coffy 2 as she put the video into the VCR and rewound it. He sat tentatively on the floor and she stretched out on the couch behind him. She didn't stop talking until ten minutes into the movie. She would occasionally interrupt herself: "Look, the taco stand!"  
  
This was why he liked being around her. He was completely unnecessary. She could conduct an entire conversation by herself. Yet he was also totally crucial: she couldn't perform without an audience. He didn't have to do any work, just figure out when to ask questions and what questions to ask, and he could feel important at the same time. He settled in, leaning against the couch, listening to the sound of her voice without registering the words as she continued to share her expansive knowledge of useless trivia.

* * * *

He watched her sleep as the movie rewound. Should he wake her up? Should he just leave? He stood there, chewing the inside of his mouth as he tried to decide. It was then that the thought occurred to him, and once it had implanted itself inside his head, he couldn't get rid of it. At first the words were whispered, and then they became louder, more impatient, until finally he knew exactly what he had to do to shut himself up.   
  
He looked around her room. Harvard, Harvard, Harvard. Everywhere. Harvard, and books he'd never read. He wasn't just snooping around; he had a purpose. Maybe it was in the dresser. He looked inside each drawer, pulling them out slowly to avoid making too much noise. Socks. Underwear. More books. Old magazines with Jonathan Taylor Thomas on the covers.   
  
He was about to shut off the light and wake up Lorelai when he noticed the bed table had a drawer, too. One last possibility. And there it was, right on top. The first letter he'd ever written her.  
  
He stuffed it in his pocket and headed back into the living room. Lorelai was, thankfully, still asleep. He knelt beside her and said, "Hey, I'm gonna go."   
  
Her eyelids fluttered briefly, but otherwise she registered no sign of having heard him.  
  
He paused. Should he try again? Louder? Maybe he should just leave.   
  
He stood up decisively, too quickly. She reached out with one hand, barely awake. "You don't have to go," she whispered.  
  
"Yeah, I think I do," he said softly.  
  
"Yeah."

* * * *

He studied the little lines on her face like he was trying to solve a mystery. He lifted her limp hand, examined the inside of her wrist. The bright blue veins looked like tributaries on a map; that didn't explain anything. She had asked him to stay, and he had agreed, not because she reminded him of the other one but because she didn't remind him of anyone, and if he wanted to he could pretend there was no reason why this couldn't happen. She had pulled him down onto the couch with her, and they had struggled to find a mutually comfortable position, eventually settling for her head on his chest and his hands clasped and resting loosely on her back. She had fallen right back asleep, and he had considered following her there. The bright blue light from the TV screen flooded the room, which was silent except for the quiet, steady buzz of the VCR and, in the kitchen, the refrigerator's low hum. The moment was surreal, and he wanted to stay awake just long enough to burn it into his memory.

* * * *

"People are going to talk," Lorelai teased, drumming her fingers to a beat only she could hear as the coffeemaker gurgled.  
  
"If you're going to Luke's," he said, rubbing the sleep out of his eyes and trying not to yawn, "why are you making coffee now?"  
  
"So that I can drink it on the way to Luke's," she explained, as if he were very, very slow.  
  
"That's a serious addiction," he half-laughed.  
  
"What are you going to do about it?"   
  
He never knew quite how to respond when the playful barbs became suddenly pointed. Was it a challenge? "What do you want me to do about it?"   
  
He could play this game, too. Her eyes widened, then narrowed, in the space of a second and a half. "Shut up," she replied, smiling. "I've been drinking coffee longer than you've been alive, sonny."  
  
He wasn't sure whether he should be annoyed. He decided not to be. "I hear it stunts your growth. No wonder you're so short."  
  
"I am not short," she gasped.  
  
"You're right. My mistake."  
  
"I'll have you know I'm of perfectly average height for a woman my age."  
  
"Keep telling yourself that, Doc."  
  
"Doc?"  
  
"I was trying to think of a dwarf that wouldn't be offensive. Sleepy wouldn't work. Grumpy and Dopey would sound mean. Happy--no. Sneezy? No. So, Doc."  
  
"Oh, I get it now. Makes perfect sense when you explain it that way. Good one."  
  
"Stop trying to change the subject."  
  
"What was the subject?"  
  
"I don't remember."  
  
"I am the master!" she proclaimed, pouring herself a cup of coffee. "Want some?"  
  
"No thanks. I'm a growing boy." He stood up, trying to accentuate the height difference between them. "Speaking of which, I should get home."  
  
"Is your mom going to kill me?"  
  
"No, I told her I was spending the night at a friend's house last night. I had planned to sit on the bridge all night feeling sorry for myself and hating everybody."  
  
"Glad you didn't?"  
  
"Yeah."  
  
And he smiled at her, and she smiled at him, and it was a bizarre moment because she would swear he was getting closer and she wasn't backing away.  
  
"Bashful."  
  
"What?" He didn't stop moving. She didn't start.  
  
"You forgot Bashful."  
  
"You want me to call you Bashful?" He was inches away now.  
  
"No."

* * * *

Never, never, never, never, never.  
  
She hoped that if she kept repeating it she could convince herself-the irrational part of her mind that was defending the whole sad affair. _It was only a kiss,_ crazy-Lorelai pointed out.  
  
And he's only a teenager.  
  
_So? So are you, basically. Just a really, really old one.  
_  
Oh, my God.  
  
_You never used to be this uptight.  
_  
And look where that got me.  
  
_You can just pretend that he isn't who he is. Or who he used to be. Whatever.  
_  
No, no, no pretending. Bad. Not going to happen. Ever. You're insane.  
  
_But don't you get it? It would be so perfect.  
_  
Yeah, because he's _dreamy.  
_  
_No. Because if you had met him 19 years ago instead of Christopher, we wouldn't be here now.  
_  
He wasn't _born_ 19 years ago.  
  
_Stop avoiding the subject. You can't outwit the master.  
_  
Oh, yes, I can. Look, I can't have this conversation with you right now. Or, you know, ever. Just get back in your little box or wherever it is you usually hide and stay away from me. And stay away from him.  
  
_Fine. 'Never, never, never, never, never.'  
_  
She sighed and sped up a little. This wasn't helping. Maybe some more coffee would kill it. Yes. Luke. He always had the answers. Not that she'd be asking the questions. But that was the beauty of it: she didn't even have to, with him. Which was good, because she wouldn't ever be telling anyone about this.  
  
_It doesn't have to end so tragically, you know.  
  
_Yeah, it does. It really, really does.  
  
_It could be our secret.  
  
_Never, never, never...

* * * *

Dean walked home slowly, turning the morning over and over in his mind. On the one hand, the idea of it made perfect sense. He understood that. And he understood why she had bolted, backed off, why they had parted at her front door with a couple of muttered syllables strung together incoherently.   
  
On the other hand, it was insane.  
  
But he couldn't help remembering this: during the night she'd shifted suddenly, and he'd jerked awake, thinking someone had unexpectedly come home, even though it was too late to be the evening and too early to be the morning. It had been simple paranoia, of course; he'd looked down at her and noticed a sliver of peach satin beneath her beige blouse. Her work clothes. He'd closed his eyes and tried very hard to sleep then.  
  
It was insane. What the hell had he been thinking?  
  
He sighed, stepping onto the bridge again, the one that wasn't the Tallahatchie but would do for now. He could deal with Lorelai and that whole thing later. Probably just an adolescent fantasy or something, right? But they got along so well   
  
No. Later. Right now, there was one more thing he had to do. He found the letter, the first one he'd ever written her, folded into a million triangles in his pocket. He unfolded it, looked at his own handwriting, the way he'd spread the words across the page, telling her everything about the way he felt. Too much. He'd been a stupid kid then. He felt a million years older now.  
  
The crumpled notebook paper caught fire quickly. He watched as it fell into a pile of ash, the embers fading quickly. The wind picked up the last remaining evidence of the way he once thought he'd feel forever.  
  
He stood up and walked away without looking back.   
  
He had more important things on his mind now.


End file.
